


Reparations

by 1000PaperCranes



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Death, Earth Kingdom (Avatar), Fire Nation colonies, Gen, Ignores Legend of Korra, Learning to Be Fire Lord, Mistakes, No Beta: We die like mne, Post-Avatar: The Last Airbender, The Shoe Is On the Other Foot, vengence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24366811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000PaperCranes/pseuds/1000PaperCranes
Summary: Learning to be Fire Lord is not easy.  Zuko makes the first real mistake of his reign and discovers that not all reparations are preceded by negotiations.
Relationships: Aang/Katara (Avatar), Iroh & Zuko (Avatar), The Gaang & Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Iroh, Toph Beifong & Zuko
Comments: 3
Kudos: 116





	1. Chapter 1

In the immediate wake of the final battle, Zuko recalled the troops from the Earth Kingdom. He sent some of them to clean up the mess Ozai’s attack and fleet had made, the rest he disbursed around the Nation to help the unbalance and tempers that come with shifting from war to peace after a sudden and unimaginable defeat. He was not a fool and had left troops to protect the colonies from overzealous vigilantes.

The day, like all the days since Ozai’s defeat, was bright and warm. And like all the days since Zuko had assumed his duties as successor, he spent it in the expansive, windowless studies of the palace. Zuko dropped the letter he had read and reread and reread again, still unsure how to respond.

Earth King Bumi simply wished to have the _detritus_ —his word, not Zuko’s— left from the Fire Nation occupation of Omashu and the surrounding prefectures collected; he was even so kind as to assure Zuko that this only reparation was not urgent nor was a reply. Earth Queen Yan Gi demanded that Zuko, his people, their messenger hawks, and even their very thoughts stay far, far away from Wongfung Province; she would let him know what appropriate reparations he would make when she decided them. Zuko was not looking forward to those expectations, but his current problem was Earth King Kuei. In the last five days he had received no less than six messenger hawks and one very put-upon iguana parrot each with at least two scrolls of conflicting demands.

Pinching the bridge of his nose, Zuko groaned.

His stomach answered.

Zuko stood stiffly from his cushion and wandered towards the kitchens.

What time was it? The palace staff —some who knew Zuko’s screaming temper, some who feared Ozai’s treachery and punishments, some who knew Azula’s insane demands and unprovoked banishments— never interacted with him if they could avoid it. That meant that if he did not call a servant and make a specific request, he never so much as heard them. Although, he was not at all against deliberately sneaking up on the maids doing their daily chores and silently handing them things or helping to sheet beds until whichever young woman clocked his identity and screamed shrilly enough to call down Agni.

The first time he had had nothing more than a vague desire to do something that was friendly and immediately useful. He had begged the poor girl’s forgiveness, desperately sorry, as she backed into a corner and wilted to the ground crying; Zuko had fled the palace and frantically searched for some way to make amends. He had bought her a delicate glass comb topped with panda lilies. It had been a week before he had caught a glimpse of her wearing it. After that, though, he had started startling the maids on purpose. He had bought and gifted: gold hair sticks shaped like tiny, delicate hummingbirds dragons; glass hair sticks shaped like peeking fire ferrets with very long tails and no back feet; three soft, unique shawls; hair pins tipped with flames, beads, gems, tiny porcelain blossoms, and even smaller jade turtle ducks; combs of silk flowers, gold suns, and gently tinkling bells; five intricately painted parasols; and one handsome hat for the chef. Zuko was far from done, but already the palace staff had stopped cowering and crying when he put himself in their presence. Maybe someday they would be comfortable enough to put themselves in his.

Zuko wandered the halls as he ate his prize of scavenged daifuku. Most of them were crusty but filled with spiced porcupig belly and _delicious_. The squidgy ones were filled with salmonberries and the ones Zuko suspected were made yesterday were stuffed to bursting with brined lavafish roe. It was the best meal Zuko had eaten in years, possibly ever. He would have to get all three recipes for Uncle.

After staring at the doors that lead outside to the sun —and the steps down to the caldera marketplace— Zuko sighed, defeated by his duties as Fire Lord, and turned back towards the study with the badgering letters of Earth King Kuei.

The doors banged open behind him and Zuko spun to face the sound, dropping into a defensive stance before he had even registered who was there.

“Zuko!” Uncle stumbled into the palace, running too hectically for the sudden change in flooring. “Zuko, _nephew_ , tell me you left more troops than this to protect the colonies.” Uncle shoved a scroll at Zuko. It was the manifest of current deployments.

“I…” Zuko had a sinking feeling in his ribs. “Why?”

Uncle’s half-frantic half-horrified expression became ashy-gray devastation. “Oh, _no_.” He looked at the manifest in his hands as if he were once again seeing the official orders dispatching Lu Ten to Ba Sing Se.

Zuko felt suddenly cold.

“Prince Zuko,” Uncle said in the voice he used when teaching a lesson about the unfairness of life, “I know you meant well; you were wise to protect the colonies,” he looked up into Zuko’s eyes, pain and apology warring on his face, “but these troops are not enough.”

Zuko’s mouth sagged open as his mind went blank. The chill was turning to ice and the sinking feeling must surely have been pulling him into the floor. “Uncle?” his voice sounded choked, even to his own distant ears.

“Come,” said Iroh, halfway between Uncle and General. “We must go; quickly. It may not be too late. They are far from any other major settlements.” He was already heading back the way he had come.

Zuko rushed to follow him. “How should we get there?” The fastest way was by sky bison. Wait. “Let me send a messenger hawk to the Avatar; he might be able to get there sooner.”

Uncle caught his arm as he turned to run down the hall toward the aviary. “That is a good idea.” The General pulled Zuko along, intent on a plan he had not yet shared. “But you can do that from the airship.”

Air currents were easier to contend with than tides. It was their best option. It still seemed dreadfully slow.


	2. Chapter 2

The airship met Aang, Katara, and Sokka over the sea when the colonies were just beyond the horizon. Zuko and General Iroh leapt onto Appa with a quick gesture to Captain Jee. Silently, they scowled into the wind; no energy was spared on greetings during such a desperate mission. Eventually, the others faced the oncoming colonies with grim determination, accepting the silence even if they might not understand it.

They flew at the colonies as fast as Appa could take them, stoicism thick on the sky bison, but weightless, not matter how Zuko felt it.

“ _Agni_ ,” Uncle breathed.

An instant later, Zuko could smell it, too. Not smoke. _Dust_.

The smoke came what felt like much later but was not, after the colonies had appeared on the horizon, after they could see the dark streamers lifting into the air through the khaki haze. They flew low, for clearer air; then, at a signal known only to him, Appa slid into the water. Sokka’s posture read grim surprise, but he did not even change his grip on the reins.

It was clear, as Appa swam them towards the craggy cauldron of the bay, that they were far too late. As they passed the natural spires guarding the heart-shaped bay, the dust became thick enough to taste and even the acrid smell of creosote smoke could not cover the unfairly edible smell of burning bodies.

Aang retched.

Zuko caught him with a hand to the boy’s chest, ready to move him whichever way was prudent. A dull hope that Aang would find the touch soothing did nothing to make Zuko believe that there was any such thing as comfort in this situation.

At first it looked at though the four villages, that three weeks ago had been sprawling towards each other in a state of constant ebullient growth, now were completely dead. The buildings were scorched, yes; some even still burned with weak, aged fires, but the true damage had come from the ground. The docks were wrenched loose, the boardwalks twisted, streets ripped, and buildings heaved; there was not a level place anywhere. The spire of one tall, fractured building had a soldier impaled upon it. Bodies laid and hung and dangled and slumped. The dust and the smoke and the eerie quiet pressed upon them as they drifted. The place was unnatural.

Something clattered. Not the dripping of blood on something metallic and hollow, not the snap of a flag in the smothered breeze; a solitary instance of sounds. Zuko’s eyes caught movement. A child, and a small one, but alive, disappearing up a ruined alley.

Many other children were dead. Zuko caught sight of a toddler’s body pinched between the boards of a dock, beginning to bloat in the tandoor conditions. Suddenly, the General’s hand shot back, clenching discretely in Zuko’s robes and he knew Uncle had seen it, too.

They did not dare go ashore; the carnage was bad enough from the bay, and Appa shied away from the bloodstained currents at the water’s edge.

Zuko knew, abruptly, how every person of every other nation had been made to suffer for the last hundred years. He was empty inside. Not numb, but distant from the horror, unable to touch it because it was just so far beyond his ken. Men, women, children, _infants_ … dropped and dead on every conceivable surface. Few were soldiers and even fewer wore the greens and tans of the Earth Kingdom. Zuko could not even be sure that any were firebenders. The use of torches was certainly poetic, and while obviously not beneath an earthbender, was probably secondary to a night attack.

It would be nice to say that the Fire Nation did their enemies the courtesy of attacking during the day, but that was for their own benefit under the light of the sun. The wheedling little thought slithered away as Zuko’s mind conjured the jumbled horrors of a midnight siege and the pure viciousness of savaging families abed.

It was no worse than unleashing an army on the gentle nomads that had produced Aang, and certainly less strategic than mercilessly obliterating an entire people.

No, this… This was rage. A century of earned rage unleashed on people who were not all innocent, though undoubtedly many were. Silence was all Zuko had to offer; everyone, attackers and attacked, were in pain here. It was all any of them had to offer and it stretched slowly ahead and behind them.

“Hey!” They looked sharply toward the voice. “HEY!” Toph waved to them from the streets, running towards them from between two rupture buildings. “Get me out of here!” She was already scrambling down the embankment when the Avatar suddenly scooped her up. Zuko had not noticed him move.

When they landed on Appa’s back, Zuko pulled Toph close and she _climbed_ him. He hugged her where she perched in his arms and found nothing to say.

“It’s awful,” Toph murmured into his neck. “Children dead. Children wandering around, screaming for their parents. Children wandering around _silent_.” He felt her crying against his neck.

“I’ll do what I can,” Zuko promised into her ear, having spent precious time breathing in the unique argil scent of her hair. He gently handed the ball of earthbender to Uncle. She latched onto him just as tightly. Uncle said nothing.

“We have to do something,” Katara said, tone lodged somewhere between a growl and a plea. She stared at Toph curled like a toddler in Uncle’s arms.

“I’ll go,” Zuko said, forcibly interpreting ‘we’ as ‘himself,’ _alone_.

“I’ll go with you.”

Zuko stopped his climb down Appa’s flank, giving Katara a look that simultaneously silenced her and made her furious. She glared back into his eyes. He flicked his gaze to indicate Aang, who was so openly stricken that tears charged down his cheeks and he was statue still, his body not even appearing to breathe. Zuko believed that the Monks must have embraced tears, as Aang never tried to hide them, sometimes seemed not to even notice them, but this was different.

“I know what I must do,” Zuko said, as much for Uncle as for Katara. Katara glared at him, but broke for an instant, shooting an unsure glance at Aang.

Zuko jumped into the water, unconcerned with the blood he would have to wade through; he was bound to be covered in more than blood soon enough. He was not followed, and that more than anything confirmed his suspicion that the three young warriors had not noticed any survivors. Uncle would come back after he properly reallocated the troops; and after Toph let go of him.

Looking back was not an option, but Zuko still heard when Appa flew away. He suddenly felt very small. The damage was so great, and he was just one person.

He was not, however, the only person. Young women tended to the wounded and dying. Even younger men, boys really and fewer of them, clawed through the wreckage. Children, in greater and greater numbers by each hand smaller, wandered or tried to help or sat and cried. It was for those souls that sat and stared into nothing, the ones that did not cry or toil, for which Zuko worried most strongly.

Zuko sighed, unwilling to consider how this tragedy might affect himself. He had work to do. Each body would need to be cremated and each departing soul would need a prayer to Agni. He would find someone to care for the living he discovered. A green booted foot poked out from a wall; he would place the dead of the Earth Kingdom together, on the ground, as far from the villages as he could reasonably take them. The Earth King could send a delegation to deal with them in their own way.

Grabbing the nearest blood-streaked, dirt-stained, red-clad body, Zuko hauled it into the sun. He felt blunt about it, but the man was dead, and Zuko knew there was too much work ahead. He would save finesse for the children because he knew he would never be able to be efficient with them. It was _hard_ to light the empty stranger ablaze, but Zuko knew it was the only thing he could do for the man. A cold comfort and one that would do nothing to make cremating the many children he knew were waiting anything but borderline impossible.

Zuko breathed in with the flame, and out with the smoke; he implored Agni to guide the dead.

**Author's Note:**

> I have like one stubborn paragraph I need to finish for Memories Lost before I do anything else.


End file.
